On Turning 60

September 16, 2017

On Turning 60

almost 60

On the High Line, Days Shy of 60

So, 60 I am. First, the day.

September 14 arrived as most days do. Early. There must be some Upper Midwest stock in me, for I live a little like a Norwegian Bachelor Farmer might. (Actually, nothing about me matches the link, but I rise early, I work hard, I go to bed early, and I’m not married. And I am planning a vegetable garden at my new home.)

Thursday rocked on. Lots of Facebook greetings, and I responded to all of them. At least I think—and hope—I did.

Facebook has its detractors. I understand some of the issues associated with FB, and I know many who don’t like

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Postcard from New York

September 3, 2017

Postcard from New York

guitar

New in Town, with Guitar

“Where’s Union Square? I just got into town a few minutes ago.” So asked the young fellow with the guitar over his shoulder (just to the right of the traffic signal post), to the guy standing next to me a few blocks from Union Square on Friday, September 1, 2017. My thoughts wandered back to 1961, when a future Nobel laureate from Hibbing, MN—the Zimmermans’ boy—wandered into town.

As prior posts—here, here, here, and here, and, gentle readers, thanks for indulging me—reflect, I like New York City. Lots. Borrowing from the opening lines of Manhattan, “Chapter one. ‘He adored New York City. He idolized it

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Get Over Yourselves About Impeachment

September 3, 2017

Get Over Yourselves About Impeachment

 

impeach

The New York Times reported, on September 1, that Mueller Has Early Draft of Trump Letter Giving Reasons for Firing Mueller. Political Wire linked to the story, with the headline Pence Linked to Decision to Fire Comey, and wrote: This is a pretty big deal.

No, it’s not! I’m sorry, but the people who focus on a legitimate basis for impeachment are so “decades ago.” But not even, for future President of the United States of America Gerald Ford said, on April 15, 1970, “an impeachable offense is whatever a majority of the House of Representatives considers it to be at a given moment in history.”

Impeachment won’t likely be in Donald

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I’m So Vain, and Other Stuff (the Bee)

August 25, 2017

I’m So Vain, and Other Stuff (the Bee)

Greenwood SC

Totality

You’re So Vain by Carly Simon—every thinking man’s “you know what” (13, 9, 12, 6, and you figure it out)—includes in its third stanza the following words:

Then you flew your Lear jet to Nova Scotia, to see the total eclipse of the sun.

So we had a total eclipse of the sun on August 21, 2017, in the United States of America. No, Donald Trump gets no credit for it. And when Hari Sreenivasan mentioned on the NewsHour last week that the total eclipse was scheduled for Monday, I thought he might have “special knowledge” about end times. Maybe I’d be “done for” in South Carolina.

South Carolina. I’d

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Mr. Joe Arpaio, President Donald Trump, and the Pardon Power

August 14, 2017

Joe Arpaio, President Donald Trump, and the Pardon Power

arpaio trump

What a Pair!

Trump says he’s considering pardon for Joe Arpaio by Matt Zapotosky for the Washington Post gives you today’s disgraceful news.* And it’s our jumping off point!

I wrote Pardon! and No Egos at Mark Rubin Writes. Pardon? in June and July, respectively. When I wrote the pieces I really expected President Donald Trump would give his family his first high-profile pardons. No matter, for those pardons will surely follow. For now, the Arpaio pardon raises some interesting issues.

Sheriff Joe Arpaio was sued several years ago.** The suit involved racial profiling. Judge Murray Snow, a U.S. District Judge in Phoenix, held the sheriff and others in civil

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Cacophony of Crap: The Trump Decades

August 3, 2017

Cacophony of Crap: The Trump Decades

cacophony crap

Cacophony of Crap, Mess of Merde, Superadundance of  … well, you get the idea! The man has been in office for just about 194 days. Roughly 16.693 million seconds. I’m exhausted, and not shy about fessing up!

Remember when President Donald Trump fired James Comey, the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Within a day or so the president said, about the firing: “I faced great pressure because of Russia. That’s taken off.” We all screamed obstruction of justice. Remember? Wait. What? “Who’s James Comey?” Feels like eons ago!

There’s good stuff happening in the Time of Trump, for sure. Check on your retirement accounts. You’ll smile. For me, at

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You Can’t Go Home Again

July 28, 2017

You Can’t Go Home Again

mark hat

In April 2012—more than five years ago—I wrote You Can’t Go Home Again. (Truth be told, and I only note this because I read the piece again, I wrote the piece, mostly, in April 2011, when my daughter enrolled at my and her mother’s alma mater.) Alas, I had more Can’t Go Home experiences this week.

Two-day strategic planning conference. “Show up!” I did, and I gave myself a mini-staycation at our venue, Loews Ventana Canyon Resort. The resort sits less than a mile from the home my former spouse and I built and first slept in on Friday, March 13, 1992. The place our daughter called home for almost 24 years.

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Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, and the Promise

July 24, 2017

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, and the Promise

Mr. President

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels came to mind a bit ago, as I contemplated yet another piece of high drama in the never ending “let’s mess with health care” drama.* Truth be told, I don’t know whether there’s any plot linkage between repeal and replace, and the twists and turns associated with the Big Con on the Riviera. (Not a movie I ever saw.) The title fits, and that’s more farce than this despicable disgrace deserves.

Republicans offer one primary justification for repeal and replace: the promise. Ladies and gents, have you ever made a promise, only to find out later that what you promised won’t work anymore? Or, reflecting, that you were wrong from the

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The Loft Cinema and Dunkirk

July 23, 2017

The Loft Cinema and Dunkirk

loft cinema

dunkirk

I saw Dunkirk Thursday evening at 7 p.m. at the Loft Cinema. We don’t do movies at Mark Rubin Writes, Father’s Day 2016, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and the Loft Cinema excepted. But I’m obliged to shout out for the Loft Cinema and independent theaters, and I have some thoughts about movie-watching.

Film—and, for now, I use that word most loosely—and my DNA don’t link up well. I watch almost no television. I never see more than one or two of the Best Picture Academy Award nominees, and a year having seen none happens. (Truth be told, in the last few years the show put on by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts

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The Anti-Israel Boycott Act … and More

July 19, 2017

The Anti-Israel Boycott Act … and More

I ran across U.S. Lawmakers Seek to Criminally Outlaw Support for Boycott Campaign against Israel recently. Glenn Greenwald—who worked with Edward Snowden*—and Ryan Grim wrote the piece for The Intercept, an impressive journalism enterprise which Mr. Greenwald started with others.

The story reports on the Israel Anti-Boycott Act, S. 720, and a companion bill which sits in the House of Representatives. S. 720, among other things, prevents U.S. persons who are engaged in interstate or foreign commerce from:

Requesting the imposition of any boycott by a foreign country against a country which is friendly to the United States; or

Supporting any boycott fostered or imposed by an international

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